In the footsteps of St. Francis as a Friar

At age thirteen, Raymond Kolbe was fascinated by the Franciscan ideals preached by two Conventual Franciscans who came in 1907 on a preaching mission at the parish church of Pabianice. He and his elder brother, Francis soon entered their Franciscan minor seminary in Lwow. During his formation and study there, the making of the saint continued in him. He diligently took profit of all the means that were accessible to him to sanctify himself. He took diligent care to assimilate and put into action immediately the instructions he received. He made use of his hours for prayer profitably. He never shunned sacrifices and occasions to curtail whatever that was inordinate in him. But most of all, he nourished a tender and profound love for the Blessed Virgin Mary whose devotion is at the very heart of Franciscan life as an inseparable reality of its Christ-centeredness.

On September 14, 1910, Raymond Kolbe entered the novitiate of the Conventual Franciscans. Being invested with the Franciscan habit, he was given the new name "Friar Maximilian Mary." Just like most of the saints, Friar Maximilian was also troubled; he had scruples and doubts during his formation years. The nobility of his soul made him planned to do great things for Our Lady with the thought of leaving the Order and joining the military arm forces in defense of his Mother Poland under Mary's patronage. It was proven that God has a different plan of military battle for him and was led to an understanding that his mission is a spiritual battle.

The Militia of the Immaculate Movement

Being sent to Rome to further his theological studies, he brought with him the magnanimity of his soul that will find its expression in the intensity of his love for the Immaculate. His Franciscan formation led him to be familiar with the Christ-centeredness character of the Order's spirituality and theological bent which found its emphasis in the doctrine of the Primacy of Christ. This primacy is equivalent in the devotional level with the triumph of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. Such emphasis on Christ's power and love in His redemption found its most perfect fulfillment in the Immaculate. St. Maximilian gradually discovered that in order to be a saint, one must be conformed into the likeness of Christ, a likeness which finds its verification in the perfection of the Immaculate. But to be a saint demands a total response of love made possible only through the help of grace. Mary, being the Immaculate, that is, full of grace, mediates these graces from God through her spousal with the Holy Spirit. There is no sanctity outside the influence of the Mother of Mercy.

This Franciscan intellectual tradition influenced St. Maximilian in founding a movement which had its underlying dogmatic truth on Mary's role in the economy of man's salvation and sanctification--a role that ultimately leads one to a fastest, easiest and surest way of becoming saints--of becoming like Jesus. This movement was the Knights of the Immaculate (Militia Immaculatae or M.I.). It was in the eve of October 16, 1917,  a year before his ordination. He did this with the permission of his superiors at the Conventual Franciscan Collegio-Serafico in Rome. With other six friars, he consecrated himself totally to the Immaculate and drafted a simple M.I. statutes of this Marian-Franciscan movement. Its goal is the sanctification of as many souls as possible under the patronage of the Immaculate.

Kolbe as a student in Rome in 1912

"I must become a saint--- and a great saint."

"To be a saint demands a total response of love made possible only through the help of grace. Mary, being the Immaculate, that is, full of grace, mediates these graces from God through her spousal with the Holy Spirit."